Time for another leak and rumor compilation, this time we have Warhammer 40k Chaos Knights 9th edition codex, rumors, leaks, previews. As with the other compilations the A running compilation of rumors, leaks, sneak peaks for Chaos Knights 9th edition codex. With new rules, point adjustments, stratagems and units. Compilation will feature both Games Workshop community info and any Internet leaks and rumors as they come!

Check back everyday as new leaks and rumors for Warhammer 40k Chaos Knights 9th edition codex will be added, without notification.

Pre-orders: May 7th 2022 Release Date: May 14th 2022

• Chaos Knights Codex: $55

Leaked Codex Rules

Warhammer Community Sneak Peeks

Do you feel that? The trembling earth means Codex: Imperial Knights and Codex: Chaos Knights are only just around the corner, and they’re exciting books even if you don’t have a Knight Lance of your own waiting in the wings. That’s because you can take their dark psychic powers and upgraded weapons on tour with your Imperium and Chaos armies using the new Wandering Hero and Fallen Hero abilities.

Freeblades and Dreadblades have a tendency to turn up unannounced, tearing across the battlefield according to their own whims before departing just as suddenly. Luckily, they’re so used to going it alone that they don’t interrupt the rest of your army-wide abilities.

Many of these abilities, such as the Space Marines’ Combat Doctrines and Adeptus Mechanicus’ Canticles of the Omnissiah, are only active when your entire force is picked from the same faction. However, AGENTS OF THE IMPERIUM or AGENTS OF CHAOS can often sidestep this restriction, so your Knight can join the fun.

This gives many factions the option of taking a giant armoured killing machine alongside their regular units. We’ve pulled together some of our favourite ways of using Knights in other armies.

The Big Hitter

Few factions have as much raw damage output as Knights, be it with colossal cannons or earth-shattering close combat weapons. If the enemy deploys voracious space monsters or shards of an angry god, respond in kind with the Damage 6 chainswords their mothers warned them about.

The Psychic Storm

Many Imperial armies know the value of bringing a psychic Inquisitor along for the ride, but now Chaos warbands can opt for something much bigger. You can even add the Knight Abominant to your Khornate forces, which would probably send them into a frothing rage, but then what doesn’t?

A Pack of Dogs

Did you know that Armigers and War Dogs get the Objective Secured ability in all-Knights Detachments? A unit of three even counts as a single Freeblade, so you can add the new, immensely versatile War Dogs or chain-cleaver-toting Warglaives and muscle your opponent off critical objectives.

While armies of Imperial Knights can earn honour by following the Code Chivalric, the Chaos Knights snuff out hope wherever they go. Warp-spawned phenomena coalesce around these corrupted engines like clouds gathering atop a heavily-armed mountain – if every unit in your army has the CHAOS KNIGHTS keyword,* they become true Harbingers of Dread.

This new ability offers a series of cumulative effects that emanate from every corrupted Knight in your army, creating a pall of unnatural weather that swells and twists as the fighting intensifies. At the start of each battle round, you choose an ability from one of three categories – adding a new ingredient to your bubbling brew of Doom, Despair, and Darkness.

These Harbinger abilities follow an ominous meteorological cycle – if you pick Despair, you can’t pick Darkness next round, and vice versa. You’ll need to carefully manage the ebb and flow of your nightmarish storm… Or just pick Doom for all five rounds. DOOM, DOOM, DOOM…

In any case, the first battle round always starts with Doom. These abilities focus on weakening enemy morale, and Dread Host is no exception – it penalises enemy Leadership and Combat Attrition tests, because who wouldn’t feel terrified at the sight of a pack of towering war machines?**

That grim little skull icon indicates that this is a Dreaded ability. These can be found throughout the new codex, and (similarly to auras) affect all enemies within Dread range. They normally reach out to 12”, but mortals beware – the Ruinous Powers can stretch them further…

Since you always start with Doom, when the second battle round arrives you can pick from all three categories. Despair abilities aim to disrupt your opponent’s plans and tactics – so why not grab Creeping Dismay, which stifles the range of auras and commands from enemy leaders?

Apologies to the Knight Preceptor – school’s out for summer. Of course, that means you’ll have to continue with Despair or move back to Doom next round – no flip-flopping straight to Darkness!

If you’d picked differently in the second round, you’d be able to grab a Darkness ability*** in round three. Darkness abilities focus on shrouding your Knights from harm – Pall of Darkness blots the sky with flocks of frenzied pterrorshades, inflicting a penalty to enemy hit rolls if they’re too far away from their target. It’s perfect for unleashing your upgraded plasma decimator as supernatural shadows protect your advancing army.

Ah, but if you stomped your way over to Darkness in round three, you’d have no way to snatch the Despair ability for round four! Paralyzing Insanity strips enemies of their Objective Secured ability, as corrupted vox casters flood the air with a cacophony of screaming and gibbering. It’s a wonderful way to shake down massed troops while your own War Dogs race in for the kill.

Choices, choices… With such a domino line of decisions to make, it wouldn’t be surprising if you were a bit paralysed yourself! Fortunately, it gets simpler in the fifth battle round, where the fearsome flowchart narrows to a chaotic climax with Horrors of the Warp.

This final Doom ability unleashes a wave of daemonic energy to ravage the tattered psyches of the foolish warriors who still stand against you, making Combat Attrition tests that much harder. And since it stacks with Dread Host, your foes will flee on rolls of 3 or less, with unmodified 1s causing an extra model to scarper.

By the end of the battle, you’ll have carved your very own bloody path of Doom, Despair, and Darkness – no two battles need be the same, but they will all be genuinely horrifying for your foes.

With the Chaos Knights Army Set coming soon, we’ve had a look at how these cursed weapons have changed, and how their pilots can petition the Chaos Gods for Dark Favours. But that’s not the end of their fell power.

The terrifying new Knight Abominant is not just a battlefield bully with puissant weaponry from a darker Age – such as the volkite combustor* – it’s also a Psyker that can call on the uncontrollable power of the empyrean to manifest ruinous powers from the Warp Storm discipline.

An Abominant can manifest two psychic powers per turn and knows two powers from this exclusive discipline. They draw power from the roiling tempests within the warp, making it a sort of malicious, mystical meteorologist, divining the weather and coaxing it to do its bidding.

Winds of the Warp summons forth a hurricane of gale-force winds that are so powerful they send projectiles careening off-target, with forks of lightning to prematurely detonate warheads – any time the caster loses a wound, a D6 roll of 5+ prevents this from happening. If they manifest this blessing on an 8 or higher, the winds may mutate and weld shut the damaged carapaces of War Dog-class Knights. If they’re within 6” of the Psyker when they lose a wound, you can roll a D6, and the wound is not lost on a roll of a 6.

This inclement empyric weather also has offensive applications. The delightfully named Spitesquall conjures a hateful deluge of warp-tainted rain with the undesirable side effect of dragging enemy souls into the warp. The targeted unit may neither fire Overwatch nor Set to Defend, presumably due to their chattering teeth and tormented spirits.

You’ll also need to keep a tally for that unit, adding one every time a model is destroyed. At the end of each phase, if the unit is still on the battlefield, you roll one D6 for each tally mark, and for each roll of 5+ the unit suffers one Mortal Wound as the daemonic damp claims another victim. The tally rests at the end of each phase, so you’ll need to coordinate your attacks to deal maximum damage.

There are four more powers on offer, from coruscating lightning storms to hideous vortexes designed to tear your opponent’s forces to pieces and scatter them to the four winds. But what if your Knight Desecrator wants a piece of the Psychic action?

Tzeentch has you covered! Any Chaos pilot can – for the dubious price of pledging their immortal soul to the duplicitous Changer of the Ways – earn the gift of the Pyrothrone for their Knight. This cockpit fills the pilot’s mind with the combined arcane knowledge of nine-hundred and ninety-nine long-dead magisters. 

In short, this gives the model the Tzeentch keyword, provides any Knight who isn’t an Abominant the Psyker keyword, and grants the ability to manifest and deny one psychic power. If they are already an Abominant, their power is multiplied to manifest and deny psychic powers up to three times a turn.

Couple that with the favoured ability – which you earn for racking up the kills for your daemonic patron – and you can turn one of these tusked Knights into a maelstrom of metaphysical power and make Tzeentch proud.

The accursed Idolators of the Dread Households are busily bathing the joints of their masters’ war machines in blood, offering sacrifices to warp-charged engines, and bolting as many spikes onto twisted hulls as possible. That’s right, the dark knights will soon thunder into action in the upcoming Chaos Knights Army Set, which features the new Knight Abominant and two loping War Dogs – alongside a special edition of the new Codex: Chaos Knights.

This tome contains all the rules you need to customise your baleful steeds to your blackened heart’s content – and not just in the armoury. Whether your Fallen Nobles embrace the Plague Lord or honour the Architect of Fate – or even if they’re more of an Undivided soul – you can seek the Favour of the Dark Gods for a mighty host of options to upgrade your Knights.

Battle-forged armies containing a Chaos Knights Detachment can grant a Favour of the Dark Gods to any Knight in their army. That model gains the keyword associated with its patron god, as well as a powerful new ability – and even a Favoured ability, which you’ll unlock by reaching a certain tally of kills. Naturally, the bigger your Knight, the more kills you’ll need to offer before the gods take notice.

Are you impatiently revving your newly-improved reaper chainblade? Are you sick of blunting your metal teeth on sacred relics and advanced force fields? Khorne’s Blood Shield offers an answer to such trickery – give a Knight the KHORNE keyword and you’ll be able to shut downall invulnerable saves (for your foe and yourself*) once per battle.

At least, that’s once per battle normally. Offer enough skulls to Khorne – say, from Dark Reapers who just lost their fancy Aspect Armour invulnerable save – and you’ll get the chance to trigger the ability a second time.

The Blood God isn’t a fan of sorcerous trickery, but those who can’t resist the new psychic Knight Abominant needn’t worry. Each of Khorne’s Favours come with a cute side-effect, trading the Abominant’s PSYKER keyword for improved Weapon Skill and an extra Attack.

On the flipside, Slaanesh offers Knights swiftness beyond imagination, turning lumbering engines of destruction into blurs of chrome and steel. Subjugator Machine Spirit binds the gluttonous soul of a fallen Subjugator Titan** into the confines of a Knight, saturating every piston and synapse with its overwhelmingly powerful ego.

Overtaken by battle-lust, the Knight gains the SLAANESH keyword, and counts as having Remained Stationary when shooting even if it Advanced or Fell Back that turn – rush in to unleash hell with your avenger chaincannon, or dance out of combat while laying down shots with your laser destructor. Feed Slaanesh enough souls, and the chosen Knight will be able to charge in the same turn as well – Knight Rampagers rejoice.

If you’d prefer your pilot to enjoy a balanced diet of warring Chaos gods, you can instead devote them wholly to the PANTHEON UNDIVIDED, for Favours like the Blessing of the Dark Master. A Fallen Noble who offers worship to a particular shadowy demigod*** can receive a tenebrous cowl in return, shrouding them from the vision of even the most skilled sniper.

This umbral boon prevents your opponent from re-rolling hit, wound, and even damage rolls – cut down enough enemies in the name of the Shadow King, and unmodified hit rolls of 1-3 will always fail when they target the gloom-touched Knight, making your formidable Knight Tyrants nigh-unstoppable.

There are 15 Favours in all, each with a points cost (and Power Rating increase) suited to each class of Knight. It’s one Favour per Knight, and no duplicate Favours – the gods are a jealous lot – but with so many to choose from, there’s no need to double-up.

Will your Dread Household devote itself to one god, throw their lot in with the Pantheon, or spread its worshippers around, pitting pilot against pilot to see who can reap the most handsome rewards for their particular patron?

Knight Houses have always been competitive – and traitor and loyalist Households have a particular enmity, so with both Codex: Imperial Knights and Codex: Chaos Knights just over the horizon, they’re itching to do battle with an extensive arsenal of upgraded weapons. In what we can only assume is a bid to coax new Noble pilots to their side, both factions are here to show off their most improved wargear.

It’s time for a runway walk-off of titanic proportions.

Plasma: For That Glowing Look

In a classic fashion faux pas, the Knights Castellan and Tyrant have both come wearing the same weapon. The venerable plasma decimator (or ectoplasma decimator for team Chaos) has always been a favourite for melting swathes of elite enemies, and it’s received a serious upgrade on all fronts – Strength, Armour Penetration, and even Damage.*

Will these brave Knights be content to use the safer, low power option, or will they reach for even higher Strength and Damage as they ignite the catwalk with its even riskier supercharged mode?

Chainswords: Fashion Made Flexible

Kicking your opponents to death is so last season,** and Knights of all classes have instead begun to swing their reaper chainswords and thunderstrike gauntlets in wide arcs. Given that these chainswords are the size of trees – and a mite more dangerous than even the most well-heeled giant foot – Knights appropriately attired for close-quarters combat earn a solid power boost. What’s more, the reaper chainsword comes with two fresh new looks – for sweeping away hordes of enemy infantry, or striking down a single large target.

Lasers: Claim the Spotlight (of Death)

In an attempt to win over undecided Nobles with fancy ancient technology, the Chaos Knights debut the Desecrator’s updated laser destructor. The Idolators have been hard at work to make this long-range firearm much more reliable than before – and while consistency may not be especially Chaotic, redirecting power from its explosive blast allows the destructor to punch through armour more effectively, dealing eye-watering damage with every shot.

The Imperials’ fabled Knight Preceptors*** strike back in the contest for the laser crown, with snazzy enhancements to the classic las-impulsor. Both firing modes explode back onto the scene with the Blast rule – all the better for evaporating swarming masses of vile aliens – as well as more reliable Damage for placing your shots appropriately.

Blast keeps the Knight Preceptor from firing at enemies that get too close – at least, under normal circumstances – so the high intensity version also gains an extra 6” range to help keep your foes distant.

When you only have a handful of stompy mechs on the board, it’s important that they each excel in their chosen role. The upcoming Chaos Knights Army Set offers you dozens upon dozens of different loadouts for the forces within – and thanks to these flexible build options, you can reign supreme across the Shooting phase, the Fight phase, and even the Psychic phase.

As we saw in the announcement at AdeptiCon, the War Dog Karnivore is a dedicated melee monster, equipped with a reaper chaintalon for sweeping away lesser chaff and a slaughterclaw for crushing hard targets. Unburdened by ammunition stowage, the Karnivore’s impetuous spirit also gives it an extra burst of speed, so it won’t be left languishing in no man’s land.

For those who prefer unleashing devastation at a distance, the same kit also builds several other varieties of War Dog, each loaded with some properly scary guns. The War Dog Stalker finds a middle ground by trading one of those melee weapons* for the fearsome avenger chaincannon – and its 12 infantry-shredding shots – or a tank-melting daemonbreath spear.

The War Dog Brigand takes it one step further by eschewing blades and claws altogether, packing two ranged weapons for a tag team of arms-length armaments. All three varieties also come with a classic carapace-mounted havoc launcher** for additional firepower, which can be traded for a diabolus heavy stubber should the mood take you.

Knight Abominants have become so corrupted that they can control the immaterium itself, manifesting terrifying psychic powers from their unique Warp Storm discipline, which can suffuse allies with the power of the Empyrean and wrack enemies with the same.

They also pack a volkite combuster, using technology from the dark days of the Horus Heresy to atomise elite infantry and light vehicles alike under a beam of deflagrating death. Coupled with its thrashing electroscourge arm and nesting flocks of sinister Pterrorshades, the Abominant is a sight plucked from your nightmares.

If psychic powers aren’t your style,*** the Abominant kit also includes all of the parts to build a Knight Rampager, equipped to sunder mortals and machines alike in close combat, or a gun-toting Knight Desecrator. An ancient laser destructor – a weapon the Imperium can no longer replicate – gives the Desecrator enough firepower to challenge even the lumbering Knight Tyrants as it blasts apart heavy tanks in a single volley.

This maddening panoply of options mean the Chaos Knights Army Set can fill any gap in your existing forces – or form a balanced foundation for a new Dread Household. Crush your enemy under an iron stampede with two Karnivores and a Rampager, or despoil their lands from afar with War Dog Brigands and your choice of Abominant or Desecrator. It also contains a special art edition of the Chaos Knights codex and a set of datacards – the only place these will be available for some time.

The monstrous, psychic Knight Abominant was revealed at AdeptiCon, along with the new Codex: Chaos Knights. Now, we’re taking a first look inside its cursed pages to learn about some of the vilest dread households to ever claim a Chaos Knight – and their most infamous battles.

House Lucaris

House Lucaris threw in their lot with the arch-traitor during the Horus Heresy – and they didn’t take the Warmaster’s death well, vowing vengeance upon the Imperium. They’ve been as good as their word for 10,000 years, butchering their way across the galaxy from their warp-storm shrouded homeworld, Morda Prime.

Infamous Battle: The Fall of Graggen Keep – In the wake of the Horus Heresy, the Knights of House Lucaris came to blows with a member of their household who remained loyal to the Imperium. Unflinching Steel was wrecked and dragged back to Morda Prime – where it’s said the Noble Pilot is still undergoing punishment, ten millennia later.

House Herpetrax

It’s a bit tricky to call House Herpetrax “traitors”, since they never actually swore allegiance to the Imperium. Their home world of Jedathra was only discovered long after the Great Crusade – and having spent most of Old Night rejecting so-called “Emperors of Mankind”, when the representatives of a dead one showed up, the Herpetrax decided they’d much rather stick with their profane rituals than worship a corpse on a golden throne.

Infamous Battle: The Kreen Scar – Billions died when House Herpetrax invaded the Kreen Worlds and enslaved their populations, using them to dig up the foundations of their own hive cities in search of ancient technology. Once they claimed their prize, Herpetax exterminated the surviving slaves via massed orbital bombardment.

House Khymere

House Khymere fell foul of the strange way time moves within the warp. This once-loyal House emerged from the Cicatrix Maledictum to attack the Imperium, and were promptly declared Iconoclasts. When an Imperial strike force arrived to destroy their homeworld of Surtur’s Wake, the confused Nobles claimed to be loyal to the God-Emperor. To save their planet, House Khymere fled into the Great Rift – from which they would emerge, warped and embittered, years in their own past.

Infamous Battle: The Conflagration of Rho Zapphire – Knights from House Khymere tipped the balance in a battle between the White Scars and Slaaneshi daemons, leading to the destruction of an Imperial Navy fleet. Once they ignited the fuel derricks supplying the Imperial forces, the fire spread to the atmosphere of an entire planet…

House Korvax

When your entire planet is stolen and moved across the galaxy by Be’lakor, you have no choice but to pledge yourself to the Dark Master. That’s just the rules. Hence the former home of the loyal House Raven became the base of operations for the thrice-cursed House Korvax.

Infamous Battle: The Battle for Kolossi – When Be’lakor’s dark influence over House Raven’s Sacristans was revealed, members of the Adepa Sororitas rushed to aid the besieged loyalists. However, they were no match for the corrupted Knights and their daemonic allies – and the world of Kolossi was spirited away.

House Vextrix

Even Knight households want to impress their bigger brothers, and so when the Death’s Head Titan Legion fell to Chaos and declared for Horus, House Vextrix gladly followed them to the side of the traitors. Since then, they have welcomed the heretek influence of the Dark Mechanicum, and seek to destroy any who still blindly worship the Omnissiah.

Infamous Battle: The Massacre at Beta-Garmon – In one of the final battles before the Siege of Terra, untold numbers of Titans clashed throughout the Beta-Garmon star cluster.* House Vextrix marched to battle alongside the Titans of Legio Mortis, helping to ensure victory for the forces of Horus.

House Khomentis

On the Knight world of Matarakh, the Nobles of House Khomentis perfected their tactics by hunting and taming predatory beasts. Embittered by the Imperium’s destructive exploitation of their home planet, these Fallen Nobles turned to Chaos. Bonded with daemonic symbiotes, their War Dogs flush out prey for the larger Knights to obliterate.

Infamous Battle: The Hunt on Y’tach’gerra – After a band of Kroot saboteurs take down a lone War Dog and devour the Fallen Noble within, his daemonic partners mark the alien mercenaries for vengeance. A lance of Knights from House Khomentis soon arrived, and the hunters became the hunted…

Those are the six most famous Dread Households of Chaos Knights – which one will you pledge yourself to?

The new Chaos Knights Army Set is coming soon. This colossal box features the new Knight Abominant, two War Dogs, a unique special edition the new Codex: Chaos Knights, and a set of datacards – making it perfect for anyone looking to stand at the vanguard of this titanic traitorous force.  

The new army set is a great way to kick off a Chaos Knights army and perfect for adding reinforcements to an existing host of Descecrators and Rampagers. This box will be the first place you’ll be able to get your hands on the new Codex: Chaos Knights before it comes out as a separate release soon after.